The vehicle and aviation communities are attempting to achieve improved safety and reduced operating costs through various initiatives. Health and Usage Monitoring Systems (HUMS) monitor the drive train and other vehicle and aircraft component's health using specialized measurements and diagnostics. The Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) recognizes the value of HUMS and believes that component faults account for approximately 20% of accidents. The FAA believes the remainder of accidents are the result of pilot error. The Department of Defense (DOD) and large commercial operators are trying to address pilot error with programs Military Flight Operations Quality Assurance (MFOQA) and Helicopter Operations Monitoring Programs (HOMP). Both MFOQA and HOMP require the accurate measurement of inertial information and aircraft operating conditions (flight regime). MFOQA and HOMP typically require a separate flight data recorder, inertial system and Health and Usage Monitoring System (HUMS). This is often very expensive and adds significant weight to the aircraft.
HUMS are applicable to a wide variety of vehicle and aircraft platforms both commercial and military. HUMS must go through extensive hardware and software testing and certification by the DOD and FAA. This certification process is very expensive and time intensive. If hardware changes are made to the on-board systems, a re-test and re-certification is required. Aircraft safety problems are dynamic and may occur at any time. HUMS are often not able to cope with these new problems due to certification issues. Advance Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) technologies have progressed to the stage that reconfigurable computing is possible allowing the modification through firmware upgrades without hardware recertification.